The effort to trace the history of the Philippine flag has been marked by
controversy and a paucity of reliable sources. Much of the commonly accepted evidence
relies on anecdotal sources. This is due to the loss of the first Philippine
flag, and the lack of actual flags dating back to the proclamation of Philippine
independence and the subsequent Filipino-American War (known as the 'Philippine
Insurrection' in American history.)

The Philippine Revolution began with the founding of the hitherto secret Kataastaasang
Kagalanggalang Katipunan ng mga Anak ng Bayan ('Highest and Most Honorable
Society of the Sons of the Nation') or Katipunan, a pseudo-Masonic revolutionary
movement, on August 19, 1896. A few days later, the Supremo or head of the
Katipunan, Andres Bonifacio (Nov. 30, 1863-May 10, 1897), proclaimed the end of
Spanish sovereignty, to which the Spanish Governor-General responded by placing
eight provinces under martial law.

by Jaume Ollé, 7 September 1996

by Jaume Ollé, 7 September 1996

The Katipunan's flag is commonly depicted as simply three white "K's" arranged
on a field of red, the three K's representing the initials of the Katipunan, the
red field symbolizing the blood with which members of the Katipunan signed their
oaths upon being inducted into the secret society.

In an attempt to adapt the evolution of the American flag for Philippine
purposes, it has been the fashion since the 1960s to trace the development of
the flag to the various war standards of individual Katipunan leaders. However,
historians have disputed the Philippine government's efforts as misleading. What
is certain is that the Katipunan had a flag, and leaders, such as the
Supremo Andres Bonifacio, and leading generals such as Emilio Aguinaldo, had their war
standards. It is also clear that some symbols common to Katipunan flags would be
adopted into the iconography of the Revolution. What is less clear is if all of
the war standards can be deemed the precursors of the Philippine flag.

The Philippine flag was sewn by the revolutionary junta in Hong Kong and first
displayed in battle on May 28, 1898. It was formally unfurled during the
proclamation of Philippine independence on June 12, 1898, by President Emilio Aguinaldo.
The design adopted the mythical sun (with a face) common to many
former Spanish colonies; the triangle of Masonry; the eight rays represent the
first 8 provinces that revolted and were put under martial law by the Spaniards
during the start of the Philippine Revolution in 1896; the flag was first
unfurled with the blue stripe above, but was flown with the red stripe above
upon the commencement of hostilities between the Filipinos and Americans in
1899.

According to historians, based on anecdotal evidence and the few flags from the
era that have survived, the color of the original flag was the same blue and red
as found on the Cuban Flag. In addition, this writer suggests that one can trace
the characteristics -the triangle at the hoist, the stripes, to the Spanish
colonial navigational flags for the Philippines. The original symbolism of the
Philippine flag is enumerated in the Proclamation of Philippine Independence:

"Moreover, we confer upon our famous Dictator Don Emilio Aguinaldo all the
powers necessary to enable him to discharge the duties of Government,
including the prerogatives of granting pardon and amnesty;
"And, lastly, it was resolved unanimously that this Nation, already free
and independent as of this day, must use the same flag which up to now is
being used, whose design and colors are found described in the attached
drawing, the white triangle signifying the distinctive emblem of the famous
Society of the Katipunan, which by means of its blood-compact inspired the
masses to rise in revolution; the three stars, signifying the three
principal islands of this Archipelago -Luzon, Mindanao and Panay where this
revolutionary movement started; the sun representing the gigantic steps made
by the sons of the country along the path of Progress and Civilization; the
eight rays, signifying the eight provinces -Manila, Cavite, Bulacan,
Pampanga, Nueva Ecija, Bataan, Laguna and Batangas- which declared
themselves in a state of war as soon as the first revolt was initiated; and
the colors of blue, Red and White, commemorating the flag of the United
States of North America, as a manifestation of our profound gratitude
towards this Great Nation for its disinterested protection which it lent us
and continues lending us.
"And holding up this flag of ours, I present it to the gentlemen here
assembled...
"Who solemnly swear to recognize and defend it unto the last drop of their
blood."
(as translated by Sulpicio Guevara).

Unfortunately, the drawing mentioned in the proclamation of Philippine
independence, which would settle, once and for all, all controversies
concerning the original design of the Philippine flag, seems to have been
lost.
However, from the photographs and images that exist, it is possible to
reconstruct most of the details of the Philippine flag, and point to the
various components of the flag that have changed over time, some of the
changes becoming the basis for controversy.

The original design of the Philippine flag differs from what is familiar
today, in the following details:

The sun: The eight-rayed Philippine sun was a mythical sun, with a face.
There seems to have been no definitive representation of the sun, however,
beyond its having a face and eight rays. Different numbers of minor rays,
from one on either side of the main ray, to three on either side of the main
ray, and so on, have been observed in photographs and prints.

The stars: Besides having three, five-pointed stars, the positioning of the
stars does not seem to have been applied consistently or uniformly either.

The triangle: It is clear that the original design of the Philippine flag
did not have an equilateral triangle.

The shade of blue: This is the main controversy surrounding the Philippine
flag. A good synopsis of the debate has been written by Philippine historian
Ambeth Ocampo: "In 1955, the Heraldry Commission issued the official specification for the
Philippine flag. The shade of blue given was United States Cable 70077, or
navy blue. Earlier, all flags had been using navy blue. However, the late
Domingo Abella, the Director of the National Archives and a member of the
NHI [National Historical Institute] believed that the shade of blue should
be light blue, because he says that at the turn of the century when the
Philippine flag was finally allowed to fly and be displayed after years of
suppression, flag makers didn't have a supply of light blue cloth. Thus,
they used dark-blue cloth instead, perpetuating the mistake. No documentary
evidence was presented by Abella and so, he was not taken seriously till the
late Teodoro A. Agoncillo also supported the camp battling for the
light-blue flag. E. Aguilar Cruz, another member of the NHI stated in his
monograph of [Philippine revolutionary and artist] Juan Luna that he found a
watercolor by Luna which showed a Philippine flag with a light-blue field.
[Aguinaldo's first Prime Minister] Apolinario Mabini in one of his letters
even proposed that the blue in the flag of the Revolution be "azul celeste",
or sky blue. The navy-blue camp is supported by all extant flags having this color,
plus the testimony of Marcela Agoncillo, the only surviving daughter of
Marcela Agoncillo, who made the original flag which Aguinaldo waved to the
crowd outside his mansion in Cavite when he declared Philippine
Independence. However, both sides may be wrong, because in a letter to [sympathizer
of the Filipino cause and friend of Jose Rizal] Ferdinand Blumentritt in
1898 [Filipino revolutionary] Mariano Ponce sent a drawing of the Philippine
flag which showed that the blue is "azul oscuro" which is in between "azul
celeste" (sky blue or light blue) and "azul marino" (navy or dark blue). So
the blue in the flag is not sky blue but a shade lighter than the present
navy blue. This caused confusion among the people. Someone mistook "lighter
than the present blue" to mean sky blue, which is wrong. The issue would
have ended here had Ponce kept quiet because in 1899, in one of the few
letters he wrote in English, he told a Mr. Y. Fukishama, "My dear sir, I am
sending you, by parcel post, one scarf pin representing our flag: please
accept it as a poor souvenir. The blue color of the sky means our hope in future
prosperity through progress..."
Noted historian Carmen Guerrero Nakpil asserts that the original color was "Cuban blue", although this assertion is itself subject to different
interpretations since there isn't an official shade for the color blue in
the Cuban flag. [See also: our page on the blue of the
Philippines flag.]

The dimensions: contemporary photographs from the Assembly convened at
Malolos, Bulacan, to ratify the proclamation of independence and Aguinaldo's
status as president, point to the Philippine flag having the dimensions of
the Spanish flag. That is: 2:3 up to 1:3.

Having been proclaimed, first, dictator-president of the Philippines, and
then formally elected President of the (First) Republic of the Philippines,
Emilio Aguinaldo quickly called for a Constitutional Assembly which in turn
promulgated a Constitution and established a Congress. However, in 1899,
hostilities broke out between the Philippines and the United States. Thus on
February 4, 1899, General Aguinaldo, in the name of the Republic and people
he headed, declared war against the United States. The Filipino flag was
flown with the red field up, to show that a state of hostility existed.
On March 23, 1901, Aguinaldo was captured by the Americans. On April 1,
1901, he swore allegiance to the United States, and ceased being president.
Resistance continued, however, and while the "Philippine Insurrection" was
deemed ended in 1903, armed resistance continued for some years after.

In 1907, as the elections for the First Philippine Assembly were to be held,
Fernando Ma. Guerrero, journalist and poet, decided to run as a candidate in
Manila. Guerrero wanted to be a candidate of the Gran Partido Nacionalista,
but he and Justo Lukban would not be nominated by the party to be its
official candidates for the South and North Districts of Manila. Guerrero
and his supporters decided to walk out of the Gran Partido Nacionalista .
Guerrero set up the Liga Popular Nacionalista and won an overwhelming
victory.
As one of Guerrero's young supporters, Teodoro M. Kalaw later wrote, "During the tumultuous celebration of his [Guerrero's] victory, the Filipino
Flag was very openly displayed, and with great emotion. In contrast, the
American flag received very little attention. Many American officers
considered this an aspersion cast on the American sovereignty of the
Islands. As a consequence, the Civil Commission, a few days later, declared
illegal the display of the Filipino flag, and, in general, the use of any emblem
used in the Revolution."
This was the Sedition Act of August 23, 1907.

Filipinos never gave up their loyalty to their flag; the national colors
had already been used in zarzuelas [a typical Spanish form of musical theater] in the costumes of actresses as an
allegory of the real thing. This was evidenced by the suppression of Zarzuelas
under the sedition act. On October 30, 1919, Governor General Francis Burton Harrison signed
into law the Philippine Legislature's Act repealing the Flag Law. The bill
had been sponsored by Senator Rafael Palma, whose brother, Jose Palma, had written the
lyrics for the Philippine National Anthem.

General Aguinaldo, in quiet retirement, made a statement and said, "The most historic Filipino flag was the one we raised in Kawit, Cavite,
it having been recognized and saluted by the American squadron. It was the
same flag that we used in Malolos, Bulacan, and was defended by ours hosts
[and] which, I believe, was finally deposited in the caves of the northern
Carballo mountins in Nueva Vizcaya."
As a sign of appreciation, a young businessman named Vicente Madrigal
went to Malacaņang to present the Governor-General with a Philippine flag. A
photograph was taken of the occasion, showing Harrison flanked by Senator Palma
and Madrigal, with the American and Filipino flags behind them.

The flag in the picture, it can reasonably be assumed, followed the proportions
of the previously-banned Filipino flag.

by Manuel L. Quezon III, 2 April 2002[Click on drawing for a larger image.]

For example, the above shows an actual photograph of the original design of the
Philippine flag, with the original design of the mythological sun, the
dimensions of the triangle, etc. However with the legalization of the
Philippine flag, some historians argue, the cloth available in most stores
was the red and blue of the American flag, so that the Philippine flag from
1919 onwards adopted the navy blue and shade of red of the American colors.
However, a process of simplification soon began. This is evidenced by:

by Manuel L. Quezon III, 2 April 2002

which shows the still-original dimensions (note triangle and shape of sun),
the adoption of the American shades of blue and red, but still a slightly more
ornate sun. The adoption of the American colors is further evidenced from a
party flag from the year 1922, which used the by-then well established
Philippine national symbols of the sun and red, white, yellow and blue.

On March 26, 1920, the Philippine Legislature passed Act. No 2928 which provided
for the adoption of the Philippine flag as the official flag for the Philippine
Islands. From 1919 until the eve of World War II, Flag Day would be celebrated
on the 30th of October, the day the ban on the Philippine flag had been lifted
in 1919.

With the inauguration of the autonomous Commonwealth of the Philippines
in 1936, the president of the Philippines issued an Executive Order
specifying the dimensions, etc. of the Philippine flag. A copy of the order is
shown in full on
Executive Order No. 23 issued by Manuel L. Quezon, as President of the
Commonwealth, on March 25, 1936, contained the official description and
specifications of the Filipino flag, the need for which he based on the
following grounds

Article XIII of the then-Constitution "prescribes what the Philippine
National Flag should be without giving descriptions and specifications";

Act. 2928 described "the construction of the Philippine Flag without
the necessary specifications of the different elements of the flag";

"[C]ompliance with this Act has not been uniformly carried out and
has caused the making of Filipino flags in disproportionate sizes with
different allegorical symbols of the flag.

In the Executive Order, various specifications were enumerated, which have
come down, more or less unchanged, to the present. Among the "changes"
laid down by the E.O. were the use of a plain sun ("solid golden sunburst
without any markings") with eight rays composed of one major beam and a
minor beam on either side, and an equilateral triangle ("Any side of the
equilateral triangle is as long as the width of the flag").
However, the colors of the flag were not defined in detail.
The result was the standardization of the flag, whose specifications have
remained unchanged and in effect from 1936 to the present. The new
dimensions and standardization, together with the American blue and red, can
be seen below:

by Manuel L. Quezon III, 2 April 2002

The changes to the 1898 design were:

Sun: The mythical sun was abolished and the number of rays standardized.

Stars: The angle of the stars was codified.

Color: No color was specified; the official colors would only be codified in
1955 by the National Historical Institute of the Philippines.

Triangle: An equilateral triangle was codified.

Dimensions: The ratio was made 1:2.

On June 12, 1941, Presidents Quezon and Aguinaldo, who had been political
enemies since 1922, publicly reconciled, and June 12, the anniversary of the
proclamation of Philippine independence and the unfurling of the Philippine flag
and the first playing of the Philippine national anthem, was commemorated
officially for the first time since the Filipino-American War. June 12 was
made flag day, a proclamation that would be reiterated over many subsequent
administrations. However, with the Japanese invasion and occupation of the Philippines in
1941, the Philippine flag was once more banned. It was allowed to be hoisted
again with the establishment of the puppet (or Second) Philippine Republic.
Accounts of the ceremonies held in October 1943, in which General Emilio Aguinaldo,
first President of the first republic, hoisted the flag, point to the 1936 flag
being replaced with the 1898 design; At the same time, the Commonwealth
government-in-exile in Washington continued to use the 1936 flag.

Thus on October 14, 1943, in front of the Legislative Building in Manila, Jose P. Laurel
was inaugurated president of the Japanese-sponsored Republic of the
Philippines. The ceremony was, in many respects, identical to the ceremonies
inaugurating the Commonwealth of the Philippines almost eight years earlier.
Like his predecessor, Laurel wore a cutaway; a Filipino, not foreign prelate,
gave the invocation; and, according to one eyewitness, the crowd counted the
exact number of cannon shots that boomed after President Laurel took his
oath of office - echoing the resentment that had ensued over the American
decision to grant Manuel Quezon only 19 guns in 1935. This time, Laurel
would get a 21-gun salute.
And, this time, the Philippine flag would be hoisted to fly alone, as
befitted a sovereign nation, which is what the Japanese said the Philippines
had become.

An eyewitness, Antonio M. Molina, a teacher at the Colegio de San Juan de
Letran, later described the event in his memoirs. Among other things, he
wrote:

"Some five minutes before ten o'clock Gen. Emilio Aguinaldo and Gen.
Artemio Ricarte, both of our defunct Revolutionary Government of 1898,
hoisted the Philippine Flag in the huge staff, to the tune of our national
anthem, both hitherto banned. This time the applause was deafening. For my
part, I must confess that I was unable to restrain some tears, even as I
felt a knot in the throat. They were, indeed, the expression of the
conflicting sentiments that assaulted me: on the one hand, the irrepressible
satisfaction upon seeing our national flag flutter alone, at long last, and,
on the other hand, the fear of the shame that we might be making this flag
participate in such sickening histrionic exhibition. I was somewhat
comforted, however, upon recalling that, allegedly upon the suggestion of
the Filipino leader, Manuel Roxas, the navy blue of our flag - "the good,
the genuine" as Spanish poet Peman would say - had been substituted by a pale
sky blue and that the proportion of the triangle dimensions in relation to
the rest of the flag had been altered. This was the subliminal message of
our protest, whereof the Japanese remained unaware, to make manifest that our
people are far from being gullible in the least."

There seems to be no other record of Manuel Roxas having suggested pale
blue be substituted for the dark blue previously in use; what seems more
probable is that Generals Aguinaldo and Ricarte had suggested that the
specifications of the old flag of Malolos be restored. After all, the flag
that had been banned by the Japanese after their conquest of the Philippines
had been codified only under the Commonwealth, in 1936. The two Generals of
the Malolos Republic, who had been reduced to obscurity and political
impotence during the American Regime, would have understandably leaped at
the chance to turn the clock back, restoring the symbol of their former
glory.

The 1936 flag, with the navy blue, was restored upon the return of American
forces in October, 1944 and it was this flag and those colors that were
hoisted upon the recognition of Philippine independence by the United States
on July 4, 1946.
This remained the case until 1985, when President Ferdinand Marcos ordered
the colors restored to the original Cuban blue and red. However the
historians involved say that the flag factories at the time only had a pale
sky blue available in quantity, and so this became the de facto official
color.
After the People Power Revolution in February,1986, the Marcos colors and
presidential seal and Marcos-era new national motto were abolished and the
pre-1985 flag restored.

by Manuel L. Quezon III, 2 April 2002

In 1998, for the centennial of the proclamation of Philippine independence,
a law was passed changing the color of the flag not to Cuban blue, but to
royal blue, as a compromise after a furious debate among historians and
members of the public.
The law, Republic Act 8491, approved on February 12, 1998, specifies the
following:

SECTION 4. The flag of the Philippines shall be blue, white and red with an
eight-rayed golden-yellow sun and three five-pointed stars, as consecrated
and honored by the people.

SECTION 26. The period from May 28 to June 12 of each year is declared as
Flag Days, during which period all offices, agencies and instrumentalities
of government, business establishments, institutions of learning and private
homes are enjoined to display the flag.

SECTION 27. The flag shall have the following proportions. The width of the
flag, 1; the length of the flag, 2; and the sides of the white triangle, 1.